


Stop All The Clocks

by Ash_Black



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Adult Harry Potter, Adult Hermione Granger, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Love, Ministry of Magic (Harry Potter), POV Theodore Nott, Post-Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Thestrals (Harry Potter), Time Turner (Harry Potter)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-10
Updated: 2021-01-13
Packaged: 2021-03-09 20:16:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 8,492
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27992133
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ash_Black/pseuds/Ash_Black
Summary: Theodore Nott was a pureblood Slytherin who kept himself to himself. So when a letter appears on Hermione Granger's door step from none other, she couldn't help but wonder what he wanted from her...Set three years after 'Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows,' this novella explores a relationship between Hermione Granger, and Theodore Nott, most of whom is my own creation. Together they embark on a journey through time that could change their worlds for ever.
Relationships: Hermione Granger/Ron Weasley, Hermione Granger/Theodore Nott
Comments: 1
Kudos: 8





	1. Chapter 1

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,  
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,  
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum  
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come. 

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead  
Scribbling on the sky the message He Is Dead,  
Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,  
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves. 

He was my North, my South, my East and West,  
My working week and my Sunday rest,  
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;  
I thought that love would last for ever: I was wrong. 

The stars are not wanted now: put out every one;  
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun;  
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood;  
For nothing now can ever come to any good. 

W H Auden

CAST: 

Baptiste Radufe as Theodore Nott  
Conrad Khan as young Theodore  
Mariana Barcelos as Hermione Granger   
Mukasa James Kakonge as Blaise Zabini  
Val Kilmer as Horatius Nott  
Annabelle Wallis as Laetitia Nott  
Elizabeth Debicki as Katrina Yaxley  
Alia Shawkat as Sienna Melrose  
Skeet Ulrich as Nikita Dreyev  
Edward Bleumel as Wynston Levin


	2. An Unexpected Letter

It came as a great surprise to Hermione when she received an owl from Theodore Nott asking to meet. He was reclusive at school, preferring the company of Draco Malfoy and the rest of his unpleasant gang. She had labelled him as a bad egg, stored him away on the dusty shelf of 'out of date' and payed no attention to his little smirks and sniggers. It was only until after the war that his name surfaced from the rubble as one of the few students in their year who returned to Hogwarts to take their N.E.W.Ts. He was quiet, studious and minded his own business. Perhaps it was that relentless Slytherin ambition that kept him to his studies, perhaps it was that old pureblood snobbery telling him to steer clear of the dirt. After their graduation Hermione heard no word of him until a curious little letter landed on the windowsill of her flat asking her to meet at a curious little muggle café on Thursday, 1pm sharp. 

He had changed, as they all had since their school years. His face was sharper, more angular, his eyes a little further sunken into his skull looked a deathly grey in the low light. His skin was very lightly freckled, with untidy stubble on his cheeks - not yet a beard, but not clean shaven either. His dark ashy blonde hair which was once cut with immaculate precision was unkempt and a little longer than Hermione remembered. He had always been handsome, in a sort of strange way, but now that atmosphere of still calm he carried in his childhood had turned to a grey and exhausted state. She'd seen in before in the faces of her co-workers, stressed, tired and unhappy. Oh, the joys of adulthood.

He told her she looked well, and she returned the phrase despite her discomfort with lying. When she asked him what he was up to these days he gave an odd answer, explaining he was working on something, whatever that meant, but also a day job as an archivist. 

"How's the ministry?" He asked, pursing his lips.

"Complicated." 

"Yes." He paused, then continued, a little sheepishly. "You're the only person I know who's got a job there. Or, a job of remote significance." Hermione had managed to get a job working under the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures. She knew it had been a tough couple of years for applicants, and on reflection she had got very lucky with a vacancy that wasn't just making tea. 

Hermione sighed, starting to wonder if he really had just wanted to spend his lunch break complaining to her. She certainly wasn't going to waste hers on him.

"Look, Theodore, we both know that you didn't bring me here for a catch-up. We were hardly best friends at school. So what do you want?"

Theodore looked a bit taken aback, and leaned back in his chair, those intense sea-blue eyes fluttered under his eyelids. He inhaled slowly before speaking.

"I need you to get me in the ministry."

How pathetic.

"I can't just get you a job. It doesn't work like that, you know it doesn't-"

"No, not like that. That's not what I mean." He interrupted, sounding a little irritated. "I need to get inside the ministry."

Perturbed and hungry, Hermione asked him why he needed so badly to get inside the ministry. Theo paused before answering, biting his inner-lip in what she presumed was boredom. Hermione was fairly good at reading people. She was certainly better than Ron or Harry, but Theodore was difficult. She hadn't cracked him yet. 

"Research," he answered bluntly. For a clever boy he certainly did have a wonderful way with words. 

"What research? Can't it be done somewhere else? The ministry isn't an exhibition or a public library, its the engine of the British wizarding world."

Theodore ran a thin hand through his hair in a fairly unrelaxed manner, shaking his head vehemently. Of their little face-to-face time in all her 23 years, Hermione had never seen him so unsettled.

"It has to be done within the ministry, it's complicated research and I need to access-"

"To access what? And why can't you just apply for a visitors grant?" Silence. "What research are you doing Theodore? Because I'm starting to loose my patience."

He started to fumble around in his jacket pocket, and produced a little black box and placed it on the table. Hermione frowned, as if to ask him what relevance this had, and he for gestured her to open it. She did, and pulled out a little metal object of a golf ball size. Hermione picked it up delicately, holding it up so it caught the lamp-light. It was an disk constructed of rings that orbited around the centrepiece. She knew exactly what it was. Or what it was trying to be.

"Where did you get this?"

"I made it. It's not finished. That's why I need to get inside the Department of Mysteries."

Hermione's mouth dropped open a fraction. "The department of mysteries - are you serious Theodore? You're asking me to smuggle you into one of the most secretive and protected places in the wizarding world."

"You've done it once before." He rebuked calmly

"What do you need it for?" She asked, her voice turning hard as a sea of doubt came pouring into her thoughts. He was a Nott after all, his family were death eaters, his friends too. Though most of his housemates had detached their ties with the death eaters, most surprisingly Draco, some of them were not willing to give up easily. Only a few months ago she'd heard Marcus Flint and Miles Bletchley had been arrested for conspiracies against the ministry. 

"Do you really think I'm that stupid?" Hermione challenged, leaning forward in her chair. Nott said nothing, but squirmed in his seat uncomfortably. "You know, Nott, I thought- I was beginning to think that you might be a little different. That you had other interests besides being cruel to Muggleborns and wanting to watch them suffer. I haven't forgotten that your family were death eaters so-"

"My family!" Theodore raises his voice and noticed a few stares from the two other inhabited tables at the other end of the room. "I didn't expect you of all people to judge someone on their family." He shook his head, biting his lip in frustration. "You don't know the first thing about my family." He spat with surprisingly venom. He looked over at Hermione with a hostile gaze that made her shiver. After a hot silence he stood up without a word, pulled his denim coat over his shoulders, slapped a muggle note on the table and dragged the box across into his pocket. He walked out, the bell over the door ringing pathetically after him. 

Without any cognitive recognition of her actions and moving instinctually, Hermione stood up and followed him. It was raining outside, but she felt strangely compelled.

"Theo, wait!" 

He turned, his hair flattened slick over his eyes from the rain. "What do you need it for?" She asked, surprised at the kindness in her voice. "Why do you have to turn back time?"

He looked at his feet - at the darkening navy of his shoes before answering without eye contact. "I want to bring my mother back."


	3. The Watchmakers

It was one of those bright grey mornings when Theodore entered the clocksmiths off the Golbourne Road. He had first heard of Kasri when enquiring at Borgin and Burke's about any delinquent parts one might associate with a time turner. Distcreet, if possible. To the vast majority of the Wizarding world, a demographic in which Theodore's family was distinctly not included, any shop nestled in a dark corner of Knockturn Alley was on the 'wrong side of the tracks'. The owners of the other side's major artefact shop were cold-blooded muggle haters in their prime, and had never much bothered with any thought to the ethics of their commerce, and less so to the complex knot of morals surrounding the altercation of time. 

The shop assistant, a balding fat-lipped man in his fifties - neither the shrewd Borgin nor the cantankerous Burke, grumbled thoughtlessly at Theodore's inquiry, and running a fat finger down a thick-spined registry pointed at the name 'Kasri'. "Whore ologist" he said, the word ringing strangely in Theodore's head. 

Theodore restrained the urge to respond but merely raised an eyebrow. At the sincere look on the man's face, he peered over at the registry to see the word he was referencing. He wasn't aware there was a study of women of the night, less so how that was in any way connected to time-turners.

"Says 'ere he's a squib. Mean's he's not under Ministry jurisdiction. If it's untraceable you want, try him." He finished bluntly, shutting the old registry with a swirl of dust, and gave him an ugly grimace that Theodore took as 'move on.' 

It was this exchange that led him to the door of the clock-smith's, looking up at the faded old sign that read 'Melrose and Kasri, specialist horologists' in dry old gold lettering on a sun-browned black, the latter name much past it's prime in a kind of muddy yellow with cracks running through it. It was one of those small shopfronts crammed in to the cobbled side-street as an afterthought. It looked more like a relic than an actual functioning business; a small and anachronism in this fast moving world with its little shelves of beaten copper crammed with faded brass trinkets, gleaming little glass orbs and the faint persistent sound of taking behind it cobwebs trailing from the corners in an not-quite Bohemian way. Theodore pushed open the door, which when he'd come the previous day after his shift had been locked, the owner neglecting to turn the sign that hand on the door to 'closed'. This time, the frame swung faster than he'd anticipated, bumping into a circular hall table that seemed to have a dent from like-mindless customers. The dust almost stifling, and he caught its sifting glow in the sunlight before casting his eyes across the little shop. Shelves rammed with clocks, hooks, indistinguishable pieces of metal, little chains draping from sides, silvery orbs and everywhere the zigzag pattern of cogs artfully intertwining themselves with one another. It was total chaos, but totally charming, wherein even the most graceful people could feel like a bull in the china shop. The three dimensional sound of quiet ticking was both nauseating and soothing, and he stepped a foot towards the counter to ring the small brass bell for service. Seconds later, a thud of footsteps coming down a narrow set of old stairs could be heared before a figure burst through the door to the counter. Round faced, pale skin smattered with gentle brown freckles, a mop of unruly black curls and large brown eyes gleaming like orbs with a generous smile. This was not the Kasri Theodore had in mind. Yesterday, a newspaper cutout illuminated by a lamp on the shop's wall showed an ageing Middle Eastern man with a thick black beard, and handsome cheekbones of tan skin. It occurred to him that maybe he had received the image up-side down in his fatigue and beard had become bob, but even in that case the similarity was ludicrously stringent.

"I'm looking for Mr Hanif Al Kasri." Said Theodore, clearing his throat as the young woman tied up her tattered brown worker's apron behind her which was striped with streaks of black oil and scuff marks from the snag of sharp metal.

"Yes. Sorry, I'm afraid he's away at the moment. But I'm here." She began enthusiastically, her dark twinkling up at him.

"Oh, I see..." said Theodore, pausing uncomfortably, the cogs of his own mind running over the complicated situation. Kasri was a squib, but there was no telling what this woman was. One couldn't ask a muggle if they were a witch for obvious reasons, and if she indeed was a witch he would be exposing himself to someone who knew very much just how dangerous time-turners were. "When is he back?" Theodore asked hesitantly as not to sound impertinent. 

"Not for a number of weeks. I'm his daughter, Sienna. You know, 'Melrose'" she said, giving a nod to the outside of the shop to imply its name. "Well, that was my mum's name, so I took it after she. But I promise he's my dad! My middle name's Miriam, so a good Muslim name even though I don't look it. Not that you have to, you know-." She fizzled out, before adding oddly. "So I suppose I'm not really Arabic on paper but I promise you we're related." 

Theodore's expression must have given away a certain look of bewilderment at her incoherent little monologue, because she smiled apologetically at the eccentricity of her own outburst. So, she was his daughter then, and most probably a muggle. He stifled a disappointed sigh before he began his excuses to back out of the shop. A muggle couldn't help him with a time-turner, so he would have to excuse himself. The Theodore of only a few months ago would have walked out without another word, but this world he was operating in was not the one he had grown up in.

"Ah, I see. Actually, it's something very specific that I needed to speak to Kasri- your father about, so I think-"

"That's ok, specialist is our thing! I'm sure I can help, I'm just as qualified as Dad. Do you have the piece with you?"

Theodore halted. He was usually quick witted and able to fashion the right words, but the way things were heading made him think twice. "Well yes but- look, I don't want to sound rude, but it really is only your father I can talk to this about."

He watched warily as her expression hardened to one of steely defiance. "My dad left the shop fully in my trust, because I'm fully capable of seeing to any watch. Just because I'm a woman, doesn't mean I can't help you. That might not be what you- but it's starting to look like it and it's seriously disappointing coming from a good loo- a young man like you." She said, her head held high in a look of swearing disapproval.

It would have been easier for Theo to walk out, but his feet were immovably planted on the ground. Walking out would confirm he was implying that her gender meant she was less qualified, which was not the reason for the dilemma. Being a pureblood, he rarely came into contact with muggles and was even less concerned about the way he treated them before, but he was not a misogynist and was rather tired of such labels being ascribed. He found himself reaching into his coat pocket to bring out the box, placing it onto the counter. 

"It's just a little project, and not a watch in the same sense." Theodore excused reluctantly as she opened the box, no doubt immediately baffled by the hourglass in the centre of brass rings that spun on axels. But the expression on her face was not of ridicule or befuddlement, but of acute concentration as she held up the object, deftly turning it around with microscopic and tactile attention. 

"Some sort of hourglass, but turned by the rings. Fascinating." She murmured in absorption of before returning her attention to Theo. "I'm sorry, I've just never seen anything like it. I'd say an experimental form of a pocket-watch, so the design probably dates back to the renaissance era. Fascinating." She said again with a look of defiant excitement as she her attention to Theodore. "If you leave it with me, I can have a dig and see what I can find? My dad has loads of books about esoteric artefacts like these."

"Thank you, but I really can't do that. It's very precious."

She looked as though she were about to say something else, but changed tack. There was clearly a sensibility in her that he hadn't expected given her slightly blundering speech. "What if you leave your address? I can write to you if I've found something. It's pretty unique looking so I can do it from memory and we can go from there?"

In regular circumstances Theodore would have declined such a request. He was very dubious what she could actually offer him, and concerned that he would be bringing her into a world that she was very much not welcomed to. There had evidently been no discussion about her father's magical heritage, and bringing muggles into their world was not something Theodore would do lightly. He was also of the mind that the less people know about you, the better. Silence spoke volumes of power; knowledge being the greatest weapon one could possess. Like arms, knowledge could be dealt, and an address was just one of those things that found its way into the wrong hands. In fact, it made all the sense in the world to decline her offer and walk out having partially regained his dignity after the peculiar interaction. But there was something; perhaps the look on her face of ardent enthusiasm, the charming smile and the look of sparky determination in her eye that meant he simply couldn't refuse.


	4. Machinal

The Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures, forever cursed with an abysmally unmemorable name, churned it's forces like a great machine; cogs turning, steam whirling, and the tap tap tap chatter of the typewriters, scratch of pen upon the rows of desks a mile deep that extended into blackness. One could easily mistake it for some sort of prison camp; the drab uniform of its tired employees, the sniffer-dog workers with their heads bent crooked over desks full of papers about Somebody McSomebody who kept a Troll in his back garden, or dealt precious Occamy eggs to smelting companies run by terrorists. The forever hopeless hopefuls, on the grind day in day out. The ones with the pipe-dream for Magizoology, the once love for animals drowned out by years of slamming their heads in frustration against walls, the ones with a mission for justice for their fellow creatures, be it two legs or four, six or eight.

Hermione found herself in the middle of this, feet paddling frantically beneath her as she tried to keep afloat, swimming constantly against the tide of failure. 

Apart from the general feeling that everyone was drowning out of existence, Hermione didn't spend much time addressing the emotional and personal needs of her colleagues, but rather on the task ahead of her. S.P.E.W, which started in fourth year after she witnessed Barty Crouch's house-elf Winky cry herself sick on account of her master's unwavering cruelty. It had been a laughing stock at school, and met with indifference from Harry and whining reluctance from Ronald. She had not, and would not let the protestation of the men in her live, specifically the latter, stop her.

Society for the Protection of Elfish Welfare, as it was officially known, had earned her a place in the department and a minor fast track. As with most cases in her life, the team which she pitched her concept to was all-white, who coughed their way awkwardly through the presentation, and asked "But what about those families with a history of elves under their care?" 

It was not until the mild but commanding presence of Kingsley Shaklebolt, who had been watching from the back of the room, patiently explained that S.P.E.W was bigger than house elves, and that to ignore it would be to condone emancipation and send a rather unsavoury message to the 20% of the population who weren't white, and particularly to those who shared the complexion of Hermione and himself. Hermione gave him a wry smile. She would not have put it so kindly.

And so she found herself here, the main floor of the department for the regulation and control of magical creatures researching the case of Blonky the house elf in her overtime. 

"Granger." Sung a little voice from her right as he wheeled his chair over to her desk. Small brown eyes set just too far apart, arched eyebrows and a grin that made him look like a demonic frog. All that, with being an almost-handsome despicable little prick. 

"Granger, pssst!"

Came the voice again. Hermione inhaled with her eyes shut to hide the unimpressed eye-roll. 

"Yes, Levin?" Hermione conceded, turning to face him with an upright posture, an icy tone in her voice.

"Have you finished Grouse's report?"

"Yes." She replied, as though it was obvious. He had ruptured her rhythm, and she was not impressed that he had brought her mind back to a task she had finished two days ago when she had things to do.

"Right, well, can I see your results? Yours are always so in depth so they are far the best for comparisons, obviously, because you are you talented."

Subtly was not Wynston's strong point. When they had first met he had asked her out for a drink. Hermione declined, naturally, and she caught him no more than five minutes later leaning on another girl's desk with that same old smirk and sweep of his hair that he called charm. But when he was milking it so much, he was obviously desperate. Lazy people got like that and there were no lows they wouldn't stoop too. Hermione felt generous enough to save him that embarrassment.

"Fine. I thought people grew out of this kind of thing." She said, pulling open her draw and passing the file to him without so much as a glance. 

"Oh come on Granger, you know you love it." He said in that gravelly voice. "Nothing gives you a greater kick than to save the day from the village idiot." 

As much as she despised him, his words were bitingly true. "You wish, Wynston." She replied, rolling her eyes. Wynston liked you think he was a ladies man. She didn't socialise that much with the other employees, but she could guess it was more like wishful thinking.

"First name terms, are we? What does your boyfriend call you, 'Mione'?" He asked with a grin, moistening his lips.

"He's not my boyfriend."

"Glad you got rid of him, not a fan of, you know, the hair." He said, waving his hand around his head in a loose gesture with a sincere look on his face. "Fancy a drink tonight then?" He asked, flashing a devilish grin up at her.

"Absolutely not." She said with a scoff at his punchy tactlessness.

"Come on, Hermione, you know you want to."

"I'd rather get back together with Ron than want to." Hermione snapped, a little too suddenly. By some miracle, Levin seemed to read the signs and with his hands up in resignation wheeled back to his desk. Hermione swallowed. She hadn't realised how saying that name made her feel queasy. Because the breakup had been difficult. Evenings spent in Harry's company, the boy split in two, wanting him to understand, but every time she tried to talk about it she felt a crushing weight. Ron had not taken it well. He swore, raged, and vowed not to ever talk to Hermione again. She didn't want it to be that way, but it was, and she didn't understand why it hurt so much. Why it still did. 

When she looked to Levin to say something, she realised his attention was elsewhere. Hermione followed his sight line to the man approaching her desk, and her heart sank a few leagues deeper. 

"Granger, slacking are you?" Called the harsh voice of the overseer who had taken a particular liking to nagging Hermione like an impatient dog. She smiled politely, and made a gesture of returning her gaze to her desk. Between the chatter of the typewriters and 'things to do' she hoped he'd move on and badger another employee, but she knew he wouldn't. "Better. You can take these" he said, lazily tipping a two inch thick file of papers onto her desk. 

"I have overtime to work on my own project." 

"House-elves, wasn't it?"

"Yes, and-"

"Do these." He said with an almost-growl and a harsh look on those stony features before walking off to collect his coat. In all her six months at the ministry, she had never seen Dreyev delegate work to anyone else. It seemed to mirror that first potions class (and many to come) when Snape took an immediate disliking to Harry because of his fame, and to her because of her thirst for knowledge. The concept of her own 'fame' post-war was not something the had gotten accustomed to, but people like Dreyev reminded her of it daily with his little maxims of bitterness. He had since done everything he could to stop her from succeeding, be it overloading her or belittling her in front of colleagues; he did not take a shine to whom the papers called 'the golden girl'. 

Hermione sighed, and flicked through the new pile of papers, and reached over to her coffee when a single phrase caught her attention. 'Department of mysteries'. Theodore. Her eyes scanned the rest of the page, and with a quick and sheepish glance around her to check no one was watching, slipped it into her coat pocket for later. She was sure that a page on the most secretive department in the ministry wasnt supposed to end up on a junior's desk, but it had, and she would seize the opportunity with her arms open.


	5. This House

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A window in time, our first glance through Theodore’s childhood

IT IS NOVEMBER 1988, When nine year old Theodore is summoned to the Nott London house in Kensington and Chelsea. The little boy, wearing his favourite blood orange jacket, which he bought on a day out at a muggle market,stares up at the unpleasant colonnades. So white and stark. This is his father's Business house. His board game, his playroom. Home is for family, here is for business. His mother always looks grey whenever she comes here. When Theodore asks why, she says it's because it makes her feel cold. Theodore does not understand why. London is much warmer than Donegal.

Burridge stand beside him; their Porter. Father used to say house elves weren't a good market, and Burridge had proved reliable enough in carting Mr Nott's things up and down the country. 

"Well, master Nott?" Asked Burridge, his gloves hand clutching the suitcases. "Shall we go in? Your father is expecting you."

Theodore swallowed. That was exactly what scared him. Why had he been summoned here? Perhaps he and mother were going to surprise him. But that didn't seem much like his father at all. 

Burridge rings the doorbell, and Theodore is let in to the dark, mahogany hallway of the ground floor by their Doorman, Khan, who bows his head. Theodore hates these formalities, but be obliges. His bags are taken away, and Theodore tries to ignore the beady eyes of Sister Orlaith (a distant relative, never happy about the fact she was moved to London) follow him across the hallway, offering spiteful remarks about the state of his repulsive muggle clothing. 

Theodore makes his way up the old staircase, and inquires where his father is, before making his way up to the reading room on the second floor.

He opens the door, and is hit by stench of Horatius' Nott's cigar smoke which clouds the room. He is talking to someone, though through the smoke and the light from the windows Theodore cannot make out who. 

"Theodore." Horatius announces, accompanied by a gruff little clearing of his throat. 

"What are you wearing? Take that stupid coat of." He says, his fat face slipping in to a condescending smirk that he sends towards his guest. Theodore hesitates, but does as he says. Father does not take kindly to disobeying his orders in from of others. "Now, Katrina and I have been talking. Your mother is... incapacitated, so Ms Yaxley has kindly agreed to be a guardian in her stead. A Governess, if you like."

"I don't need a governess." Theodore replies sharply. He doesn't like the sound of this. "Where's mother?"

"Don't be rude, boy. What do you say?"

"Where's mother, Sir?"

Theodore watches as he stubs his cigar out with a little sizzle. He has grown to notice the rising and falling of his temper, his little marks of frustration. Horatius Nott does not like being challenged.

"Your mother is incapacitated. You may think of Madame Yaxley as your Mother, if you so wish."

At age nine, though wise beyond his years, Theodore Nott does not understand what this means. 

He looks at the woman whose face becomes clearer now. He is not sure how old she is, but she is nothing like father. She is beautiful, like his mother, only with less kindness in her eyes. He does not trust her smile, he can feel it trying to lure him in.

"Hello, Theodore." She smiles brightly, wide blue eyes twinkling disconcertingly, and kisses Theodore on the cheeks, whispering so that only he can hear. "You and I are going to get along just fine."


	6. A Secret Life

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sienna goes through her father’s thing for some answers, and uncovers a secret bigger than she’d ever imagined.

The day that strange man came with the strange watch, Sienna Melrose set about in the evening to try and uncover what she could. She started slowly, choosing the large book on clockwork that used sand-timers, but nothing in those books was even remotely close. After a few more hours, she had upturned half the books in the store room, and still to no avail. At 11:57, the electricity went out. She should have called the electrician weeks ago, but had never got round to it. 

Fumbling in the dark, she found a matchbox, and lit some of her Dad's old candles that used to decorate the shop, and stopped by the door to her Dad's room. She hadn't been in there since he left. He'd moved out of the flat - said he didn't want to take up space. Sienna said he should know he didn't have to do that, but he wouldn't listen. He was stubborn as anything, her dad.

Despite his absence, she felt like she was invading his space. Her father had been a kind man, always, but very much held privacy in high regard. Instinctively, she went for under the bed, where she'd imagined all sorts of secrets to lie as a child. Perhaps it came from the fact that he used to hide his birthday presents for her under there, so for a young Sienna it had always been a mysterious and forbidden land indeed. Getting down onto her knees, she began pulling out contents so thick with dust it made her cough and filled the room with a heavy air.

An old prayer mat, rolled up, tattered, both empty boxes and full ones filled with old ties, shoes, trinkets from his travels. She was starting to think that this was more trouble than it was worth; hours of leafing through her dad's old things to find nothing, only to have to spend hours putting them all back the next day. But never in her life had her father failed to tend to a watch; even the strangest, oldest concoctions. He would sit at his desk by candlelight (he preferred it that way), the magnifying lenses up to his eyes, and tinker away at dusk. He was a toy-maker and the best there was, only his toys played with time. 

She dragged out a stack of old books, leaving a smear of grey dust on the wooden floor, and began to flick through them. They were books from his childhood, she guessed, with childish drawings and scribbles in poorly written Arabic. 'Yeti' she read phonetically, which annotated a rather comical drawing of what looked to be a particularly hairy relative, but apparently not. A few pagers over was a drawing of a rather sikly looking child which had 'Ghoul' (spelt Gool of course) next to it. She couldn't help but smile, and leaned through the next book. It was a diary, this time written in a mixture of Arabic and English. 

Baba says that I cannot have a wand, which is unfair because Fatimah has one. I have made my own out of the tree in our garden, but I can't make any spells yet. When I do I know Baba will let me have a handsome one like Fatimah's. 

Sienna chuckled, shaking her head. She had always known her dad was eccentric, but from what it looked like, this was not the only page of him complaining about wands. She had always guessed she had got her madness from her mother, but she was beginning to think the trait now lay on her father's side of the family. He almost never spoke about his family to her. In fact, never, of his own volition. Vague remarks, dead ends and roads leading to no-where. It seemed odd to think that they were so difficult to talk about when all her dad could write about as a child was not being allowed a silly toy. Sienna put the book down with a sigh, rubbing her eyes. She had lost the voracious energy she'd had at the start of the evening, but the more she searched it seemed the further answers became. 

Just one last book. She thought, sliding one from the bottom of the pile this time. The title page was in Arabic, of which her grasp was tenuous at the best of times. Although her father spent his childhood in Morocco and later Saudi Arabia, he had married a white woman. About as white as he could find. He had chosen to leave that part of him behind. It was a small wonder it only took his old age to call him back, to return east. Sienna had learnt to read the script as a girl, but at the first chance she had discarded it for more 'interesting' things. If only she had the patience, she could have learnt it properly. 

The title of this book read something about the magical or spiritual. Looking through the appendix, it was a kind of catalogue of obscure items. Bringing her candle closer, and rubbing her eyes awake, she started at page one (which had always muddled her Anglo-centric brain which refused to accept it as page one at all), eyes wide for any diagrams of that distinctive shape. And on page eighty four, she found what she was looking for at last. A diagram, in its full glory of that very object Mr Nott had brought in earlier that afternoon. 

"Yes, Yes!" She yelled, quite forgetting the thinness of the walls, and how tired she was. Slipping a dangling shoelace into the book to mark the page, she leapt to her feet, stumbling over the obstacle course of miscellany strewn around the room and spilling in to the corridor, she grabbed her coat. 

Most sane people would have waited until morning, but Sienna didn't care. She was well aware of her insanity, and figured the only way to live would be to embrace the madness. The slip of paper which her client had written his address was (not so neatly) folded into her pocket, and she squeezed it tight with joy as she tumbled out into London's streets at god knows what hour, heading for Kensington.

She threw herself on the bus heading West to Shepherd's Bush, her sleep deprived brain in a heightened state of electric and new-found energy. She knew she is catching stairs, her mop of unruly curls, jiggling her leg with anticipation as she opened the old book time and time again to try to decipher the Arabic, willing any residing memory of the words she could create in sound only. 

She reached the door of the house, up the steps, and it occurred to her that Kensington is a very expensive part of London. The size of the steps and door alone would probably cover the surface area of the whole shop, let alone the towering floors above. Breathing in, checking the address one last time, she knocked on the door. 

After a brief wait, she caught wind of some kind of commotion inside, something between shouting and giggling, perhaps both, before the door swung open.

"Oh. You're not Mr Nott." Sienna blurted our in surprise, quite taken aback. Stood before her was a young man, around her age, wearing the remains of a suit (he has removed the jacket and tie, and his shirt is wrongly buttoned). He has smooth, dark skin that looked like it hadn't seen a blemish in its life. He might just have been the most handsome man Sienna had ever set eyes on, but somehow she was quite repelled. Handsome men never really did it for her, especially when you got to know them. Handsome men were often the most repulsive breed of human, her mother and her always used to giggle.

"No, you're quite right." He said smoothly, a deep and honeyed tone of voice, his chest rising and falling as though he was out of breath. "And you are?" He prompted, after an awkward silence.

"Sienna Melrose. I need to speak to Mr Nott."

"Can it be left with me?" He asked hopefully, still hanging on the door. Sienna guessed he was drunk, or at least half way there. 

"No, I don't think so." Sienna said apologetically, remembering the guarded nature in which Nott had approached her. He was obviously very particular about this unique watch. 

"Well then, Sienna Melrose. I'm having a party upstairs, would you come in? Theo would hate to know I simply left you in the doorway." He added, a suave little smirk on his lips. Sienna hesitated. There was very little about this man that she trusted, but she felt like it could do little harm if Nott was waiting inside.

Sienna followed him upstairs, and her eyes widened when she realised he was having an actual party. He mentioned it of course, but her brain was on other things. She had never been one for parties, and this didn't seem to be an exception. The room just next to the staircase, the high-ceilinged and containing-a-grand-piano-sort-of -room, was packed with people. The next room along, Sienna had to stop. She couldn't believe what she was seeing. A champagne bottle was levitating, and pouring itself into glasses around the room. She tried to look for strings holding it up, but there were none in sight. That was quite a magic trick.

Just as she turned back to the man to ask her about Nott, she came face to face with a painting that was eyeing her closely in a suspicious manner. "Well, who are you?" It asked, it's lips moving. Sienna jumped, a confused yell escaping her lips as she leant back into the bannister for balance. 

Maybe there was a trace of something psychosis-inducing on her father's things? She could hardly believe it. Maybe this was what next-level exhaustion did to your mind, but even she'd pulled enough all nighters at school to know even that wasn't right.

"You're talking. You're a talking painting. What the fuck?" Said Sienna, still recoiled against the bannister as the woman sneered unpleasantly down at her. 

"I cannot believe." Continued the woman, her shrivelled little eyes peering down over a hooked nose at her, "that any member of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Nott would let such revolting debauchery take place in this house. Out I say, out!"

"Come on, what's holding you up?" Interrupted a voice, this time from the real world. The smouldering face of the black man who'd beckoned her in to this place was peering his head around a doorway, a bottle of something now in his hands, a little smirk dancing across his lips.

"Holy mother of- did you hear that, or am I going absolutely mindbogglingly mad? The painting was talking! And next door room, things were floating, and-"

Just as she spoke a woman with no shirt on just crossed the stairway, whilst her hair tied itself up in a bun. 

The man approached Sienna, and pausing, he looked down at her in a bemusedly puzzled way as she stood mouth open in shock. "You're a muggle, aren't you?" 

"A what?"

"Come with me, let's get you a drink." Sienna, too baffled to refuse, followed him into a room where he poured her a glass of whisky, offering it to her. Just as he poured his own glass, the woman with the self-tying hair walked in, leaning on Blaise's shoulder kissed his neck and whispered something into his ear. 

"Not now, Imelda. I'm with a friend of Theo's." He said, a mock look of disapproval on his face before whispering something back to her which made her blush a deep red before, smacking her behind as she left the room. 

"I'm sorry," began Sienna, starting to lose her patience with whatever mad trick this was. This was not her type of party. Nor was any party, for that matter.

"Who are you? Where's Nott? Is this even his House? And what was outside, what the fuck is going on!"

"Relax," said the man, pushing her a glass which she took gladly to numb the headache. "You're going to need it."

"My name is Blaise Zabini. I'm a friend of Theo's - your Mr Nott. Theo's out, so I took the liberty to throw a party." He leant back in his chair, which made him look quite regal. He was well-dressed, or rather was well-dressed. It look like someone had tried to undress him but never managed to finish the job. His fingers, which had slowly started tapping the arm of the chair, were heavily decorated with expensive rings.

She knew they were expensive because the shine of diamonds was like nothing else. And they were hardly discreet. They were a mark of a man's status if ever there was one. It surprised Sienna, that a young black man could dress so much like the old white men who used to come proudly to the shop and commanded her father fix their watch. They stood there in their tweed, starched white shirt and designer ties and look down rather smugly at the little brown man who worked away, probably fantasising about the rounds of applause they'd receive for supporting the 'local Arab artisan' when they told their colleagues. 

Yet this man, was, well. Black. And by god he fitted the part of a Lord, but she doubted that there ever was a black Lord in the history of, well, ever. This was Nott's house, and this man was it's Prince Regent.

"So," Sienna began, blinking back from her daydream. "You're his...partner?" Sienna guessed, pouring herself another glass of whiskey. 

Blaise laughed, his eyes lazily turning towards her. "Nah, just a friend. But you're his date right?"

"Date! God no, I've only met him once. He's my client." Sienna burst out, perhaps a little too loud. She had a habit of splurging her words, but his suggestion had caught her totally off guard. She had never been any good at the 'think before you speak' mantra her teachers tried to drum into her at school.

Blaise looked amused, if a little surprised, and looked provocatively down into his drink and murmured,

"Wow, didn't really think him the type."

"Oh, no. No I'm not- not that type of client. Oh my god. You're disgusting. No." Said Sienna indignantly, not quite sure how the conversation had ended up there. Never in her life had she thought someone could mistake her for a prostitute. But tonight had been full of many 'never in my life's', and one more was less of a surprise than it should have been. The absurdity of it made her laugh, and prompted the same in Blaise.

"Ok, so you're not Theodore's escort. Who are you, Sienna Melrose?"

"I'm a watchmaker. Ish. It's my dad's shop." She began, incoherently , before gathering her thoughts to the real trial of the evening. "Look, you still haven't explained what the hell is this place? Some kind of magic circle den? I always knew magicians were weird, but this shit is beyond freaky."

Blaise chuckled. "Ok. Here's a first. Something I've never done before." He said, downing his glass and moving on to another. "I'm going to tell you something. No, fuck that, I'm going to show you something. You're not going to believe it, but I promise it's not a lie." 

Then, he pulled out something from his pocket. Sienna realised it was none other than an actual wand. A wand. "I'm not here for your magic tricks, just tell me what-"

"Shh." Said Blaise, raising an eyebrow, and with his wand said "Wingardium Leviosa," and with that another bottle slipped off the drinks cabinet and began floating towards them. Sienna's mouth dropped open, and her first instinct was to reach out into the air to try and pluck at whatever invisible string was holding the bottle up. "Stop that," said Blaise, catching the bottle and ripping off the cork with his teeth. "Open your palm."

"Why would I do that?"

"You wanted to know, didn't you?" 

Sienna hesitated, and then unfurled her palm, which to her surprise was still clutching the little scrap of paper with the address. Pointing his wand and with a flick, the paper piece swirled into a seed, then a little seedling, then a flower, growing from her palm before her very eyes. Then without warning, it burst into flames before vanishing. Sienna was speechless, and leant back into her chair in shock, double chins an all. The two sat in total silence for a moment, before Blaise let out a snort of laughter at her presumably comic expression.

"Holy fuck," Sienna murmured to herself. "Did you spike my drink?" She said, in an accusatory tone that was riddled with disbelief. 

"No, what?" He said, clicking his teeth in an offended way. "That was real magic. Some people in this world are born with it. Me, 'Mr Nott', everyone else at this party. Why on earth Theo went to a muggle to solve his problems, I do not know, but-"

"My dad." Sienna murmured to herself, no longer really listening to Blaise. Her thoughts were no longer following a coherent train of thought. The alcohol, the exhaustion, the sheer madness of the night meant that all local responses, all pathways that lead to and from reason seemed to be long in the distant path. She had to follow her instinct to keep from drowning. "My dad, he..." Brow furrowed, she fumbled in her coat pocket for the the book, and opened the page. "This object," she said, pointing down at the diagram that matched Theodore's watch. "I can't read what it says, but this watch is, is..."

"That's a time turner." He said, as if it were totally obvious. 

"Give it to me, here." He said, and looking up at her with that smirk, tapping the page with his wand, the words on the page blurred, shifted and reshaped, until they read on the page in English. She was about to blurt out a 'how did you do that' but then remembered. Magic. Actual bloody magic. Of course. Right, totally makes sense. Obviously.

"This book," Sienna began slowly, as she read the first subheading under 'time turner'. "This was my Dad's, from his childhood. How did he get this? Was he, a magician, or whatever you called it?"

"Wizard," Blaise corrected with a condescending snicker. "And how should I know?"

"Can you be a wizard, or maybe have a wizard family but never do magic yourself?"

"Well there's squibs - people born from magical families, but without the magical gene themselves. But that's very rare."

Sienna inhaled heavily, looking down at her glass. That would explain, partially, why her father never talked about his childhood, or his family, why he kept things hidden, but it also raised so many questions. Why wasn't she allowed to know this; why did he never tell her? Had this had anything to do with his sabbatical, if it could even be called that? Her father was a kind man, always, but when the foundation of your relationship is revealed to be the form of a lie, or of a secret, you start to doubt it all. Sienna's eyes flickered around the room, searching for something to grasp onto as if she were about to fall off the edge of some great cliff. They landed on Blaise, as if pining for some security, a distraction from the chaos inside her head. 

"What I do know," he began, staring straight at her in the eyes with a look so steely confidence she was pretty sure had been unrivalled in any living being she'd met.

"Is that Theodore won't be back tonight. Either, you sit here all night worrying about your sad little watch, or you join the party." He said, savouring each word playfully as he poured her another glass. 

Sienna hesitated for a moment, but if there was one night when it was acceptable to let loose, it was the night she learned her quaint little father had been living a lie. The night she figured out time-turners were apparently not just a joke used in 80s horror films. The night she learned magic was real.

"Alright," she said, conceding as she extended her arm. "Just one more glass."


End file.
